Salt Lake evening Democrat. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1885-1887, 1887-06-18
GENERAL SHERMAN.

A dispatch stated yesterday that Gem
eral Sherman had had long talk with
Commander-in-chief Fairchild OF the
Grand Army of the Republic, and that
in that convention Sherman fully ap-
proved of Fairchild's speech on the pro-
posed return of the Southern battle
flags.
This sounds decidedly fishy. We do
not believe that General Sherman ever
approved of Fairchild's speech. General
Sherman has been credited heretofore
with that sound judgment which springs
from hard, common sense. Old Te-
cumseh is too shrewd and practical to
identify himself with rant and rot. No
man realizes more fully than General
Sherman that an attempt is being made
to suborn the Grand Army of the Re-
public to partisan party uses, and no
man deprecates the base attempt more
than the stern old leader of veterans.
In a published letter few days since,
the General referred at length to the
Grand Army matters as affected by
political partisanship. In that letter he
referred to both the Dependent Pension
bill and the St. Louis incident. OF the
Dependent Pension bill he said in effect
"that the veterans had nothing to COM
plain Of That millions upon millions OF
dollars were annually paid the survivors
Of the Union army by the Government,
while not one dollar was paid the war
worn Confederate who had escaped the
storm OF battle and the clutch of dis
ease" OF the st. Louis incident the
General spoke in words of patriotism and
good sense. He urged upon the Grand
Army veterans that Mr.. Cleveland be
received by them with all Of the respect
due to the President Of the United States,
and that it was the duty of every citizen,
as a citizen, to pay such respect.
General Sherman would evidently
make a very poor political partisan. His
whole letter is broad and liberal in view,
and is couched in language too plain to
be either misunderstood or twisted. II
is very much to the point. OF this let
ter the Kansas City Times thus speaks
There can be no two opinions in regard
to General Sherman's recent q. A. r.
letter. He punctures a multitude OF
shams, and strips the buckram from a
multitude of sneaks and hypocrites. True,
in some respects it is apologetic, and in
others given over a little too much to a
labored special pleading; but in the main
it will do good, and bring many otherwise
sensible and practical men back to a real
ization of the full sense of the respect
due to the President Of the United States,
irrespective of party ties or associations.
In his heart OF hearts General Sher-
man knows that the vetoed Dependent
Pension bill was conceived in fraud and
brought forth in iniquity that it was a
hummer bill, begotten of claim agents
and scorned Of nine-tenths of the brave
and patriotic soldiers who fought to pre-
serve the Union; that one approximating
lt-though IN no ways so sweeping, so
piratical and so uncalled for-Was vetoed
by President Grant, with scarcely an
attempt at explanation that the outcry
against President Cleveland's presence
in st. Louis does not come from the fact
that he refused to sign this or that pen
sion bill, but because he is a Demo-
crat, was made Chief Executive by
Democratic votes, and is quite likely
through the same processes to become
for the second time a Democratic
chief executive. Knowing and under
standing all this, we say, General Sher-
mans rebuke was about as timely and as
severe as might have been expected from
one occupying his position and maintain
ing the relationship he does toward the
federal soldiers in or out of the Grand
Army, and especially the relationships he
maintains toward certain Presidential
aspirant, making emphatic over and over
again the adage, as old as the world, that
blood is thicker than water.
We are not one, however, who sets
much store by these partisan outcrop-
pings of the Grand Army of the Repub-
lie. As the situation is presented up to
date no very large proportion of this
membership has so far succeeded in max
ing fools of themselves. Indeed, the
masses of them, if they chose to give
any expression at all to their views on
the question OF the Presidents proposed
visit to st. Louis, would no doubt declare
in favor OF the visit. Those whose views
have been cast in a contrary direction
are few isolated and extremely partisan
posts, and few broken down and PLAYED
out partisan politicians. OF this last
class Tuttle is fair example. His zeal
is that of the renegade, for it hasn't been
so very long ago since he was a rabid,
outspoken and unterrifed Democrat,
running for various offices on the
Democratic ticket, and serving one
term as Democrat in the Iowa legisla-
ture.
But the pertinent question connected
with this tempest in teapot is the ques-
ton: Would a single hand have been
lifted in protest against the Presidents
presence in st. Louis if the said President
had happened to be Mr.. Blaine instead
OF Mr.. Cleveland? We believe not one.
Most certainly no Democratic Grand
Army man would have put himself into
such an unfortunate position, and no
Republican would because of the want
OF margin for political capital. If it is
Cleveland, the Democrat, that the revol.
IS against, then is the danger line drawn,
bold and clear. Ii it is simply the job
bing dislike of pension sharks and beg
gars, then can the Grand Army of the
Republic purify its organization by cast
ing out those cormorants and be all the
better for the publication.